Heavenly Ranking

Chapter 452 Dead End
Streets, pedestrians, shops, stalls, and vehicles coming and going.

Ji Fuyou walked along this street not far from the Polaris Business Center.

Everywhere you look, there are countless living beings.

Even though the fog is encroaching and monsters are rampant, most ordinary people still have to struggle for their daily meals and worry about the trivialities of life.

Walking here, it feels as if time and life have been severed.

He felt like he had returned to the ordinary life he had lived two years ago, sending out resumes and looking for jobs everywhere.

The scene of the high-ranking president of the Crimson Star Security Defense Federation traveling through various other worlds as a tenth-level Celestial Realm cultivator, fighting against Celestial Realm demons and alien races, is like an unreal dream.

If it weren't for the fact that he occasionally saw traces of martial arts on some people, he would have thought that the world had never changed.

"Different locations offer different views."

Ji Fuyou realized something: "What the president of the Red Star United Defense Council saw was the invasion of the mist, the safety of Red Star, the war of the Heavenly Rankings, and the struggle for supremacy among all races. But for the lower-level personnel, even if they know about the alien beasts and monsters outside, what can they do? Just surviving has already exhausted all their strength."

He looked at the busy masses around him.

"Those in power, for the sake of their rule and stability, wear down their energy and weaken their will. Then, when danger comes, they hope that these people will have passion and enthusiasm, and carry lofty ideals and fighting spirit to do their part for the Great Shang, for the Red Star, and for humanity..."

what is this?
We need both.

In this situation, the only thing they can do is go with the flow.

The Wanling race...

Living is good, dying is also acceptable.

But isn't the same true on a macroscopic level as well as on the lower levels of Red Star?

In prosperous times, they barely survive; in chaotic times, their lives are as worthless as grass.

What can they do?
What can they do?
To some extent...

The Wanling people are even more insightful than those lowly people on Red Star who only have the power to drift with the tide.

"Peace is achieved through struggle! This is the national policy! But when those in power who implement this policy regard those 'strivers' who dare to expose and confront injustice as factors of social instability, then those in power are mostly corrupt. Moreover, this corruption is not limited to one or two individuals, but rather the entire environment has deteriorated, leading to a collapse-like decline..."

Ji Fuyou was reminded of the early days of the Federation.

Those "great men" back then were probably seen as destabilizing factors by those in power.

The world is a cycle.

The dragon slayer eventually becomes the evil dragon.

and so……

Giving up responsibility, giving up ideals, giving up pursuits, and living a muddled life can also be a kind of liberation, a kind of reconciliation with oneself.

Living is good, dying is also acceptable.

There's no need to overwork yourself...

At this thought, Ji Fuyou's wandering figure involuntarily stopped.

At this moment, he felt somewhat tired after wandering around here for a while.

I don't want to go out.

I don't want to communicate.

I don't want to have contact with people.

He wants to go back.

Go to the place where you feel most comfortable, the most peaceful place, then lie down, don't care about anything, don't think about anything, just like that...

“I do need the warmth of everyday life, but not this kind of warmth… In today’s corrupt environment, the lower classes can’t provide that warmth at all; all they have is resentment and negativity. Being with them is terrifying and suffocating…”

He started walking, ready to leave and go back...

Back to Yunjing Garden, back to Fulong Mountain, back to Yunding Mountain.

As long as he doesn't have contact with these people, it's fine.

As long as we don't look, don't touch, and don't communicate, the world will still be peaceful and serene, filled with dazzling prosperity and a golden age.

"wrong!"

Just as Ji Fuyou took a few steps, he suddenly woke up.

"Something's not right! Something's definitely not right with me!"

He instantly turned his gaze back to the masses.

This bustling street is filled with the warmth and vibrancy of everyday life.

He realized that this was a backlash from the emptiness of the myriad spirits realm against him.

This backlash eroded his spirit, almost causing him to unknowingly succumb to it, slowly losing his fighting spirit and direction, until he was swallowed by emptiness.

"Using the Realm of All Spirits to temper one's mind has such a significant negative impact!?"

Ji Fuyou felt a chill run down his spine.

At that moment, he realized that he had been too naive.

The power of the mind is not something that can be easily cultivated.

Even though he possessed the Void God Realm and had made ample preparations beforehand, but...

The aftereffects of the mental hardship still seep into his heart relentlessly.

"I need the power to ignite my fighting spirit!"

Ji Fuyou strode quickly towards some memorial sites commemorating the early days of the Federation.

He planned to go to those places to understand the spirit of those "great men" who, under extremely difficult circumstances, were able to revitalize their country and rebuild their lives, and to rekindle the inextinguishable flame that burned across the plains.

With this in mind, Ji Fuyou soon arrived at the largest memorial hall in Starlight City.

Fortunately, everyone in Starlight City now aspires to martial arts, and with the added pressure from the outside world, fewer people are wandering around aimlessly anymore. The memorial hall requires neither reservations nor tickets.

Of course, to save on operating costs, the number of entrances was reduced from six to one, and there was still a queue to get in. Once inside the memorial hall, Ji Fuyou looked at the images and sculptures that recorded history, as well as some artifacts left over from that time, and his mental state finally improved somewhat.

but……

Completely turning things around, regaining faith, and re-entering the Realm of Myriad Spirits to cultivate is beyond my capabilities.

Unless he can truly immerse himself in this history and feel the tragedy and passion of the land being submerged and then rebuilt.

But time cannot be reversed, and the past cannot be relived, so he obviously cannot experience this firsthand.

"Visiting these memorial halls and experiencing the indomitable fighting spirit of our predecessors can indeed effectively reverse a despondent spirit, but... this effect is strongest the first time, and it will gradually weaken over time. And I obviously cannot comprehend the power of the mind before the effect diminishes..."

He needs to find new ways to mitigate the negative effects of mental hardship.

"The power of the mind..."

Ji Fuyou muttered to himself.

Perhaps he really should follow the conventional approach and cultivate to the peak of the twelfth rank first.

At that time, cultivators had reached the pinnacle of self-control, and their power had also reached a certain critical point.

Achievements and confidence are at their peak.

If one can properly cultivate this "momentum" and "thought," one might be able to rely on this power to enter the realm of the mind, thereby carrying this great momentum and belief, strengthening one's inner self, confronting the mind directly, and drawing out the power of the mind.

"The twelfth rank..."

Ji Fuyou left the memorial hall.

He found a secluded spot, activated the power of the void, and amidst the swirling mist, he reappeared on Xuan Yue Island.

However, this time when he arrived at the void rift on Xuan Yue Island, he did not immediately comprehend the power of the void. Instead, he let his body float in the air. The "Great One" body simulated in the Void God Realm, his own body, and the Great One's cosmic light that he "saw" by knocking on the star gate in the real world were once again connected as one.

Endless starlight was drawn in and showered upon him, propelling his nearly fully-formed energy body further toward becoming an energy form.

Three days, six days, ten days, fifteen days...

On the nineteenth day, bathed in starlight, his energized body seemed to break free from some kind of constraint.

He reached out and clearly felt that his body seemed to become transparent, appearing to have no flesh or blood at all.

Of course, while it is possible to be semi-transparent and not have visible flesh and blood, it is too early to completely transform oneself into a ball of energy, capable of ever-changing and arbitrarily altering its form.

"Eleventh rank".

Ji Fuyou said in a low voice.

Even after reaching the eleventh level, he did not stop, continuing to push his body towards pure energy transformation.

At the beginning, it was like consolidating a realm, and the efficiency of energy transformation was somewhat improved.

However, after ten days, the efficiency of energy conversion slowed down significantly.

on the one hand……

The complete energization of flesh and blood places extremely high demands on one's willpower and life force utilization; on the other hand...

"We're almost at our limit."

Ji Fuyou glanced at the figure of the "Great One" in the Void God Realm.

The "Great One" celestial body, which was simulated long ago by the power of the Void God Realm, has not yet reached the twelfth rank despite being reshaped and improved time and time again.

Without this "great one" to serve as a blueprint and pave the way in advance, his cultivation speed naturally slowed down.

"Based on the current power of the Void God Realm... if all goes well, it will take half a year to advance the 'Great One's' celestial body to the twelfth rank. Then, in a few months, the twelfth-rank celestial body will be projected onto me, and I will try to complete the celestial body reshaping myself..."

If all goes smoothly, the whole process will take a year!
If things don't go smoothly, it might take two or three years, or even three to five years.

Other civilizations can afford to wait two or three years, or even three to five years, but Red Star cannot.

"I need the celestial conditions of twelfth-order beings! That is... I need the structure of a purely energy-based celestial body as a reference!"

Only by obtaining sufficient pure energy-based celestial references and providing data can the "Great Ones" virtualized in the Realm of Gods advance to the twelfth rank in a very short time.

The more reference data he has, the faster he will be able to complete the pure energy conversion of celestial bodies in the future.

The only problem is...

"Twelfth rank!"

Of the twelve ranks he can currently access, there is only one demon dragon.

He wanted the Demon Dragon Clan leader to reveal his celestial body so he could comprehend its secrets...

Almost impossible.

Unless he can defeat the Demon Dragon Cult Leader and render him immobile.

"An eleventh-tier being able to defeat a twelfth-tier Demon Dragon Lord is simply wishful thinking..."

Unless he can comprehend the power of the mind!
As a power comparable to the legendary, it can directly increase his power utilization rate to 100%. At that time, even if he is only at the eleventh level and the star body has not yet been fully energized, he will still have the strength to overcome the strong with the weak and turn the tide of battle.

But this brings us back to square one.

His goal in cultivating to the twelfth level was to comprehend the power of the mind.

However, one must comprehend the power of the mind to possess the strength to defeat the twelfth-tier Demon Dragon Lord in a short period of time.

It's a dead end.

Ji Fuyou frowned, unable to find an answer.

Just as he was pondering for several days, the power of the void suddenly surged from the void rift not far in front of him.

By the time he snapped out of his thoughts, the power of the void had already swirled up a vast amount of mist, and within the mist…

A familiar yet unfamiliar figure was thrown out.

This is……

"The Bull Demon King!?"

(End of this chapter)